Reds win twice on Sunday to take early command of its division
DAIRYLAND LEAGUE BASEBALL
The Whittlesey Reds took early control in Division B of the Dairyland League with two victories on Sunday.
The Reds began the day by winning 10-6 in Westboro and finished it at home at Mike Roiger Stadium with a 7-3 win over the Pittsville River Bandits.
The wins put Whittlesey at 3-0 in the early Division B standings.
At Westboro, three Whittlesey pitchers combined to allow just four hits and got past some early wildness to pick up the win. Whittlesey turned a 2-0 deficit into an 8-2 lead by the middle of the fifth inning and held on from there to drop the Trojans to 0-2 in league play.
The Trojans got that early lead without a hit in the bottom of the first. Two hit batters, two walks and a sacrifice by Marshall Westfall contributed to the rally. Butch Wiegel with a bases-loaded walk and Connor Westfall getting hit by a pitch drove in the runs.
Whittlesey tied it in the third with a run-scoring double from Cody Loertscher and Brandon Loertscher’s RBI single. Both came with two outs. In the fourth, Zach Haynes singled, stole second, went to third on a wild pitch and scored on Ben Meyer’s base hit. With two outs, Nick Meyer doubled in a run.
A four-run fifth broke it open. Consecutive singles by Cody Loertscher, Brandon Loertscher, Jon Laher and Derek Nichols started it. The Trojans got Cody Loertscher on a base-running error after Brandon Loertscher’s hit. But Nichols’ hit drove in two and, after a walk to Haynes, Cade Alexander hit a two-out, two-run single. Haynes drove in Whittlesey’s last two runs on a sixth-inning single and an eighth-inning groundout.
The Reds had 19 hits. Cody Loertscher was four for six. Spike Alexander, Brandon Loertscher, Laher, Nichols, Haynes and Ben Meyer had two hits apiece.
Westboro got two runs in the sixth on Connor Westfall’s base hit and two more in the seventh on a hit by Dayne Diethelm to close the gap somewhat.
Trojan batters struck out 17 times in the loss. Cade Alexander pitched the first four innings for Whittlesey and struck out eight. Nick Retterath pitched two innings and Cody Loertscher covered the last three. Wiegel took the loss for Westboro while pitching the first five innings. Diethelm pitched the last four.
Against Pittsville, Whittlesey did all of its damage in the second, third and fourth innings. The Reds gave up three runs in the eighth, but weren’t ever seriously in danger of giving up the lead.
Nick Meyer’s two-run double put the Reds ahead in the second. Walks loaded the bases in the third and led to a sacrifi ce fly by Ben Meyer and run-scoring hits from Nichols and Haynes. Cody Loertscher blasted a two-run homer in the fourth.
Spike Alexander pitched seven scoreless innings before tiring to start the eighth. After two walks and a single, he was relieved by Brandon Loertscher, who was greeted by Ryan Schwanebeck’s two-run single, but the River Bandits only got one more run after that on three straight groundouts. Loertscher retired the side in the ninth, capped by a nice play from second baseman Thomas Mildbrand, who ranged to his left to get to a ground ball hit by Ben Buettner and throw him out.
Spike Alexander struck out six and only allowed two hits. Pittsville fell to 1-1 after winning 6-4 in Tomahawk the previous night.
Whittlesey is at Marshfield for a 1:30 p.m. game on Saturday. The Chaparrals fell to 0-2 in league play with a 2-1 loss at Merrill. Sunday. The Chaps have allowed just four runs in two games but have no wins to show for it.
The only other league game played Sunday came in Division A, where the Rib Lake Osprey opened with an 18-3 blowout win at Spirit. The Twins fell to 0-3 in their return to league play. Rib Lake is at Minocqua this Sunday, while Spirit hosts Wausau. Those games start at 1:30 p.m.
